Monday 7 January 2013

From the Archives - Croc Blocks


A Croc Block with a skull we nicknamed Gladys
Mary works on the block in 2004
One of the other projects that some members of Dinosaur Dreaming crew have been working on is Croc Blocks.
In 2003, Museum Victoria was contacted by the owners of an oil shale mine outside Gladstone.  They had uncovered a large number  of 40 million year old turtle and crocodile fossils.  A team was sent up and spent 3-4 weeks excavating 37 blocks of fossil material. They brought them back to the museum and Monash University for processing.  Volunteers from both institutions have been figuring out what is in them ever since.  In 2005, Lucas Buchanan identified the crocodile as belonging to the genus Mekosuchinae.

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